Perspectives: Continuity
by Nitzoplax
Summary: Post Admin AU, A series of attacks on the Winter Solstice kills the president and cripples the current administration. The new president looks to past staffers to help rebuild the country. My first Fanfic, work in progress, Please send feedback
1. 365 part 1

Perspectives: Continuity: 365 Part 1 (2nd Edition)

*Authors note: usual disclaimers if you've seen or heard about them on TV then they belong to Warner Brothers, NBC, and Aaron Sorkin and if you want to archive then let me know where.  This is an AU post administration story set in the universe of a story series that I'm still pondering.  Feedback is more than welcome. Political/General/Drama/Angst, all, J/D

*This is my first work of fan fiction, and has been sitting on my hard drive since December. It is still a work in progress, so many elements are still in flux and I will periodically be revising old chapters. I think I have enough of a start on this story to opening it up to feedback which is the primary reason I'm posting on this site. So please feel free to let me know what you think, particularly if you have constructive criticism as to how to improve my writing or the piece in general. I won't guarantee I will incorporate all of your comments but I will defiantly read them and give them serious consideration.

*Thank you to all of you who have already given me your reviews and feedback, it has defiantly helped encourage me to spend more time working on this story and helped me to focus on specific problems to work on as I continue to write and edit my work.  Special thanks to SB and Blue Oyster Cult.      

*I am looking for Beta Readers, and would love to hear from interested parties.  I would especially like to hear from other writers who have posted stuff before so I can get a sense of where they are coming from.  However seeing as my obvious lack of any grammatical skills whatsoever is one of my primary problems, anybody with a strong command of grammar and punctuation who could help me improve the readability of my writing, (while still maintaining my colloquial style and original message), and is willing and able to help proofread and edit my work as well as provide feedback in shaping the direction of the stories would be a welcome asset in this venture.  

*I have rewritten large portions of this chapter and added a huge chunk of new information. I don't think my language or mention of sexual activity is anything that the average American 13 year old is exposed to so I have not changed the rating yet. Considering that this story contains massive terrorist activities, I would have thought someone would have mentioned that need already do to the violent nature of the content. If I offend anyone I apologize, this is as bad as it is likely to get. If enough people think I need to change the rating I will. 

*Chapter 1 is now 4 times longer so if you have already read the first version and are tempted to skip ahead I would advise against it. In the flavor of all those episodes where random conversations and exposition happen while people deal with nervous tension when lingering around till they can fill their role, I added a scene that helped establish Margaret and the Russells in more depth. Seeing as the Russells get killed off in the first chapter really didn't have any where else where I could establish their relationship with people with out the rosy tint that we give to relationships with people once they pass on. The way this new administration comes about, the Russell legacy is something that will weigh down on them their entire term, I thought it only fair that I clue readers in right away to how much turmoil they caused in the lives of our characters in the past couple of years, and how they might have inspired an environment of treason. I also thought it would be fun to have up tight Leo try and hold a conversation involving porn in the White House with Margaret and not have a coronary, 'cause really what better way to pass the time while waiting to hear if a man is still alive than by talking about the porn flick his wife was in.

*It was a choice to avoid naming the people they were discussing till the end of the chapter, please let me know if that makes it too hard to follow.

****** Continuity Chapter 1 *****

***** 365    Part 1 *****

** December 21, 2007 9:45 AM EST home of Leo McGarry just outside Chicago Illinois **

"Sir you need to come with us right now!" secret service special agent Grumman said as he burst in to the room followed by 4 others, startling all three people in the room. 

"What's going on?" Berryhill asked, out of shock more than actually expecting an answer.

"Explosion at the house, sir.  POTUS is still unaccounted for, so we need to get you airborne as soon as…. What? Shit. Ok we'll hold until you get an alternate route secured, and Mike I need full backup, here, now!  We're taking VPOTUS down to the bunker for now but I want to get him on the move ASAP." As soon as he finished talking into his sleeve, he was pulling the vice president to his feet.  "Sir, two explosions were just reported at O'Hare, we are going to go down to the basement now, there is an old bomb shelter down in the basement we updated to serve as a bunker when the last president stayed here for the convention last year. There are secure phone lines down there and we need to minimize your vulnerability as much as possible."

"Fine" Berryhill agreed following the agent's rather physical direction when he noticed that neither Leo nor his secretary had made an effort to follow them. "But this man and his aide come too; he is a trusted advisor and friend. More importantly this is still his home." 

"Fine sir but we need to move now." Grumman said as he was pushing he protectee "Bill would you help Mr. McGarry and his aide to the bunker please."  

**December 21, 2007****10:05 AM EST**** bunker underneath the home of Leo McGarry outside ****Chicago****Illinois****.**

As an agent was wheeling Leo's chair into the bunker another was on the phone with someone from the FBI headquarters and from the Secret Service headquarters discovering that there had now been 14 confirmed explosion sites including the one at the white house, 7 major Airports, Langley, the main broadcast studios of CNN, NYSE, Epcot Center, and 3 prominent hotels including the most recent attack  of a suspected car bomb destroying a large portion of the hotel the Vice President was staying at for the conference that brought him to Chicago. Celia Berryhill who often elects to stay home from this trip and had been moved from the navel observatory to a more secure location; however a large portion of the Vice President's staff were still unaccounted for. 

The only information they had about the White House attack was a small detonation occurred in the third floor sitting room in the east wing of the White House at 9:43 AM EST both the president and the first lady as well as 3 agents were in the room at the time, the first lady was on her way GW hospital and was considered to be in and the President had still not been reached and was believed to be trapped underneath a large section of the ceiling that had caved in from the blast.   The roof fell at angle leaving an air pocket where they could hear at least one person still breathing slow labored breaths and crying soft voiceless syllableless cries of pain.  So there was still hope that President Russell was still alive.  Unconfirmed reports had started coming in from witnesses stating that there was a small object flying rapidly towards the residence just before the explosion. 

Agent Grumman was silently thanking every deity he had ever heard of that the Vice President had made this unscheduled early morning visit to this old friend, while he was arranging for more security around the perimeter of the estate.  Since Mr. McGarry had been the White house chief of staff for the majority of the previous administration so plans were on file with federal and local law enforcement on what steps to take to secure the compound.  The agency still had relatively up to date outlines for guard placement and patrol routes since the last president had stayed at this location during the Democratic Party National Convention less than 16 months.  The task made considerably easier by the security wall that surrounded the perimeter of the considerable estate. Still he had asked for national guardsmen to assist in patrolling the grounds.  He had also asked for a judge and television camera crew to be brought here quietly just in case the President did not survive the attack on the White House. 

This was a relatively good site for their purposes, especially since the closest airport was still considered to be a highly volatile location. There was question to whether a plane could even take off with the damage done in a collision on one of the runways after the control tower went down during the second explosion.  He was even more grateful that he had agreed to this impromptu excursion after hearing about the bombing of the Vice President's hotel where they would have otherwise been.    "Oh shit" he heard through his ear piece alerting him to the seriousness of what he was to hear next: "They got the OEEOB. Repeat explosion at the Old Eisenhower Executive Building.  We just gave the all clear to go back in." 

With nothing to do but wait for more information Christopher Berryhill was trying to comprehend the facts that he had just received.  In under a half hour the country had been brought to a screeching halt. A large number of the people that he had come to depend on for guidance were lost. He still didn't know if he was even still the Vice President.  For lack of options while they sat in this poorly lit, industrial yellow cement room, he started to think about what he should be doing. Normally there would be half a dozen people giving him scenarios, options and advice, instead he was just one of two old men sitting in the corner watching all the activity in the room knowing he wasn't a part of it.   The secret service agents were not able to advise him.  They were struggling with being able to brief him on what was happening out there, and frankly they had other priorities that they needed to focus on at the moment.   He felt like he should be doing something, if only someone would tell him what he could do. All he could think to do was turn to his friend and say, "Who do I go to now?"

Leo thought for a minute considering the gravity of what his friend had just asked. His first thought was to say that he would be there to help his friend though this, and though he would do what he could.  He knew he wasn't physically up to the job anymore the cancer was progressing more rapidly now. He was already relegated to a wheel chair, (on good days), he needed considerably more rest than he ever did before, and the ever present oxygen tank never more than 3 feet away from him was all the evidence anyone needed to see to know it couldn't be him. The most optimistic doctors had given him a year but most were saying less than three months.

One person came to mind almost instantly, and he wrestled with the idea of whether to say it or not. Would he be up to it? Would Chris allow him to do the job his way? Was there anybody else who could fill the gargantuan shoes that they would have to fill? Was he letting his personal feelings that were causing his hesitancy to admit the absolute truth? There was only one person that he trusted with the mantle to lead the team of people whose burden it would be to rebuild the country after this tragedy.

He knew that it was not going to be the simplest job getting him to take it again. Hell even getting through to him was going a challenge. Even if Leo could get him here he was going to need help and no one knew how many of the current people were still around to rebuild. "I think it important that we find out whose left as soon as possible but I could probably give you a few names if you wanted to make some discrete calls outside of the current staff to assist with key areas. Angela Blake is competent, and will be fine while the President recovers.  But I think we both know who you need to bring in, (if you're going to have a chance to do any better than an Ok job over the next few months), but we need to handle it right."

"Do you think we can get him to change his mind?  We've tried to bring him in several times already.  Hell I think Russell even offered him my job, I know for sure he was offered both of his old offices, in addition to personally offering him a cabinet level post. I asked him to lead my staff.  Russell said he was even offered the flexibility to write his own ticket as far as hours and responsibilities. As a matter of fact I wouldn't be surprised if Bob still is actively trying to recruit him. I know he still has Angela on a month to month contract even though we are nearly a quarter of the way through the term. 

"What about his partner in crime?  Why didn't you actively recruit her."

"Well that's where things get murky. Up until earlier this month she was in grad school.  We may have talked to her about a mid level position in my office before the convention, but she seemed more interested in finishing school and being with her family. She certainly hasn't approached us about coming back and we're not pursuing her. Bob doesn't like her. There probably are some other reasons for that, but up until recently I thought that he didn't want to piss off his wife. Christine hates her with a passion; to the point where she tried to get the secret service to kick her out of White House during a party. You heard about this right?"

"Not all the details. They've been pretty tight lipped about the whole thing. I knew there was some sort of incident right before the before the election, but then things cooled down after the inauguration. Then something happened after thanksgiving that provided an excuse to make a clean brake from the administration without fallout from anyone in the DNC.  You know that they come as a pair; so if there is something I should know, you probably should fill me in here. Is this going to be a thing? " 

"It starts off simple enough, ever since that whole business the majority of your people avoided Nancy like the plague till well after the convention. The "sisterhood" as you all call it was particularly spiteful.  Anyway even though she had made efforts to improve her dynamic with Christine, she still was looked at as an enemy.  So naturally she became the first lady's favorite person to unload on when ever she had the chance.  She seemed to take it in stride and was always and polite with the First Lady until about two weeks before the election when she called her a "frigid, dried up, crotchety old prissy wind bag who couldn't tell accurate polling data from her own husbands dick, but seeing as [she] never bothered to try and find either one " and told her that "if [she] wanted to blame someone for the fact that another 'girl' showed up in the paper describing 'her torrid love affair with Bingo Bob' then [she] should learn how to open [her] legs as well as [she] opened [her] mouth, and if [she] really felt that the campaign would be better off if [she] took a more active role and [she] was unwilling to keep [her] husband out of 17 year old girl's beds, then [she] could at the very least stop getting in offensive drunken shouting matches with leaders of organizations representing large and important volatile voting blocks like women and college students, at least not in front of the press.  

Then she said that if [she] and [her] husband were that unhappy with the job the campaign team was doing then all they had to do was draft a letter saying that they were willing dissolve the contract that they had with any staff member who was willing to terminate their relationship with Russell for America without incident, then arrangements would be made immediately for that delivery of the gerbils to take over the campaign and [they] would never have to see each other ever again."  But that everyone knew there was "no chance of that, because while good ol' Bingo), would plummet in the polls faster than you could say lost cause.  If it weren't for the party loyalty of the people working on the campaign or the fact that President Bartlett had guilted his staff into taking an active role in the campaign in the first place, Bingo would have been lucky to get a job whoreing himself out as a lobbyist for the mining industry, much less have a having a real career in politics, say nothing of the presidential nomination." 

"What? Really she said… our..."  Leo sputtered out before braking out in a deep projectile coughing fit, before calming himself down from his pride filled animated state which had cause the coughing fit to begin with. Margaret came over and used Kleenexes collect all the mucus while he expelled the excess flem that was in his throat, and was helping him clean up some of the mess when he started talking again "Are you sure she said all that? That doesn't sound like the kind of thing she would do."

The Vice President wanted to finish the story, having allowed himself a moment to savor this memory, rather than dwell on the day's events.  After exchanging a series of glances with Margaret while she started rubbing circles on Leo's back, where she communicated Leo was going to be ok if he kept going, he continued. "It happened all right, I was there. About 3 AM the night before the VP candidate debate a very drunk Christine Russell came blustering over to where a few of us were finishing up some notes for the debate, and immediately targeted her with a barrage of obscenities and objectionable filth that would cause murderous rages in most people. As Christine kept after her we all tried to politely get her to change gears, she just politely took it.  She dismissed the efforts some people made to remove Christine from the room; saying that it was better that she got it out and say her piece. She knew that it was not going to help if the future First Lady yelled like this at one of the regular staff that the campaign could not afford to demoralize any further, or worse yet risk having her do this with someone else in front of the press, again.   Also I think she might have been waiting for an opertunity to have it out with her, with out it affecting the campaign."

Margaret handed some pills to Leo as well as an open bottle of juice. "Here take these, and I want you to drink the whole bottle.  Otherwise I'll have to ask the Vice President to find someone else to play with while you're on time out." 

Leo looked at the pills bitterly and then grudgingly took them followed by several large sips of juice, when he had finished about a third of the bottle. He motioned for his friend to continue the story. 

Margaret gave an amused but stern look at the Vice President to stop him from proceeding, seeing that Leo was trying to avoid drink all of the much needed liquid. "Leo don't you even try and press your luck with me today, you're already getting out of nap time, because of today's excitement.  If you go overexerting yourself or stop following doctor's orders that keep you in the game, then you can't play. I'll personally make sure that the only information you get from anyone working with the government is what the weather is like outside your hospital room. And you Mr. Vice President it's bad enough I let you two get each other all riled up, if I see you let him off the hook with his food, meds, or fluids, or if you in any way let him bend the rules then I'm taking my ball and going home. Do we understand each other?"

Leo quipped "To hear her talk it's hard to believe she works for me, and not the other way around" before starting to drink more of the fruit flavored fluid.

Berryhill smirked at Leo's comment until he met Margaret's glare. It was clear what was being said, Leo was going to try and help him, but he was not at all a well man and he was going to have to be limited to what he would be allowed to do.  That Margaret was going to let him come out of retirement, despite the fact that it would only speed up his already quickly approaching end; knowing that it was who he was, and what he needed to do. That being said, this was not the same Leo McGarry as the man who was Jed Bartlett's war time consigliore up until a few years ago or even the man who helped them gather support for a piece of legislation a couple of months ago. This man came with strings attached, and rule and guidelines that would have to be adhered to.  This man needed boundaries and accommodations, and that was going to get more and more restrictive as time went on. This man was also his friend and one of the best political minds of his generation; who would difficult to say no to, even though it was in his own best interest. This man would be a great asset whose contribution would far out way all of the difficulties and pain bringing him in would mean. 

As Leo continue to work on his juice Margaret was still waiting for and answer. "Do we understand each other Mr. Vice President?"

"Yes, Margaret I won't let Leo off the hook on stuff like this."

"And you'll ensure that your staff does the same?"

"That's fair, but certain things are going to be hard to shuffle around."

"We will have to sit down within the next few days and figure out some rules, until then we'll all just have to wing it and trust each other that we are doing our best under the circumstances to look out for his best interests."  Then noticing that Leo had finished about two thirds of the juice said: "But that's later, and as long as Leo you keep working on that juice, I don't see any harm in listening to gossip about a catfight over outdated polls and old porn."

Leo eyes widened at that, but was even more startled by the Berryhill's response.

"Thank you Margaret, but I haven't gotten to that part yet."

 "What in… this is turning into quite the story. What confuses me though is how come my assistant has heard it and I haven't?"

"She called me the night it happened, pissed at herself for losing her temper, and still angry about some of the things the first lady said. She needed to vent. She was also calling to check on you, remember how you were in the hospital the week of the VP candidate debate.  You were pretty out of it then, and by the time you were well enough for this kind of news there was bigger things to up date you on, like election results and the like. Besides you never like it when I try to update you on gossip, and the problem seemed to go away, so there was never much point in telling you."

"Ok.  Don't think that you're off the hook for this one yet, but I'll let it go this once.  Anyway, how does pornography enter into this?" 

"Well I was just getting to that.  After about 15 minutes straight of Christine's barrage of abuse one of the campaign staff asked if she had a point with all of this.  As a response Christine laid out that day's newspaper in front of us, as well a worn file folder, and responded "this is the point to all of this." Now you remember how the campaign was randomly blindsided by girls that Bob slept with selling their story and creating a series of sex scandal, well the morning before my debate the banner headline of the Denver Post read "17 Year Old Girl Pregnant with Vice President's Baby".  Kelly came up with probably the most brilliant example of trumping the truth with a juicier story that I have ever seen. 

'Yes, Bob Russell is the father of the child The Russells have been trying for years to conceive a child with out success. While they love their adopted children very much, they decided to make one more attempt.  Acting on the advice of their fertilization specialist, they made arrangements with the girl to act as a surrogate host for their embryo through invitro fertilization. The Russells have known this girl and her family for several years through their church, and are doing everything within their power to help ensure that the fetus has the best chance to develop through the full gestation period, because as many of you know there is a high rate of miscarriages with this process as often the body will reject a fetus that does not contain the mother's DNA.  Because of this high failure rate a decision was made to wait until the third trimester to make an announcement, rather than have a potential personal tragedy be played out in the media. This is a personal and private thing for everyone involved and her family has asked us to convey their request that you please respect her privacy. Police have started an investigation into how confidential medical records were obtained by the reporter from the Denver Post, particularly since this is not the first time this reporter illegally obtained information to write biased articles in an attempt to slander the Vice President.  The Denver Post is one of the 100 largest papers in the country and has given its full endorsement to Vice President Russell's campaign since the early primaries and we have the utmost faith that they will hold their own investigation and take appropriate disciplinary action.'

After the brilliant spin, (complete with a plausible explanation for the termination of the pregnancy), and the family being paid off, and the abortion scheduled; it was handled and we actually managed to pick a couple of points in the process. We gained a few more after we regretfully announced that the girl had had a miscarriage, and the deeply saddened candidate was still going to continue his push for the rights of American families despite this personal setback. 

But just because it was handled for the media, didn't make it easier for the wife, who knew that she had no part of any invitro fertilization process, but instead her husband had cheated on her again. What's even worse he had gotten her pregnant reminding her yet again of her inability to have children." 

"What does any of that have to do with..."

"I'm getting there. Christine then pulled the top sheet of a polling data summery, and started going off on how it wasn't fair that she had all these embarrassment's in front of the media without doing anything causing such a drastic plunge in her husband's approval rating; 'and this uneducated slut secretary slept her way to being one of the most influential women in America, and managed to weasel into position without hardly a scratch. No the press couldn't go after one of the infallible Bartletteers, because they might pull out another cancer patient or hostage situation, or if worse came to worse that lying egghead ringleader might have an MS attack and have to take another break from playing president and leave the country in the hands of the Vice President which according to this poll 73% of the voters [thought] is a fate worse than communism.  It just isn't fair that she not get slapped around in the media, in fact it's not fair that she not be slapped around in general.' That was when the First Lady slapped her."

"You mean she actually hit her."

"Yeah, well that was when she had had enough, she simply stood up eye to eye with the First Lady and win a soft cold voice took her to town with that stuff I mentioned earlier."

"Ok, but I'm still not seeing how pornography enters into this."

"It comes in after Christine not knowing she was beaten coming back with. 'I'm not going to let one of the Bartlett Harlots talk to me like that.' Christine really never got along with 'The Sisterhood' ever; and after that thing with Ellie things got even worse. Sisterhood aside apparently Christine never thought to highly of President Bartlett either and knew that that was on of her buttons. Actually from what I gather it was Christine's favorite button to push because it would almost always elicit a small visible involuntary response. 

Well anyway that was when the finishing blow came she picks up the polling data and thrusts it in the Christine's face and starts in with: 'Will you please look closely at the date on this poll and tell me what it says.  It says that this poll is exactly 365 days old.  That would put it what? 3 months before we had the first primary, maybe even closer to 4? And not that it is any of your business but I have slept with exactly 5 men in my life, one of whom I married.  I let you have this last rant because I have had it up to here with you and I wanted to let you get it out of your system because as of this minute you are done. Do you here me? Done.  I have held something back for the last several months because I actually thought I wanted your husband to win this election. But if I hear you bad mouth President Bartlett ever again, or for that matter say anything for the next to weeks with out first clearing it with at least 2 members of the campaign's communication staff, or ever call me a slut or any other reference along that line I'm going to give CNN and every major network some footage that will make me and 85% of the rest in this country look down right virginal.  Any problem you may have conceiving isn't do to some genetic curse is it Mrs. Russell? No it's because in your younger years you had your uterus scraped out to the point where there just is no lining left to hold an embryo. But that's not the piece de la resistance no you were young you made mistakes that happens. Ladies and Gentlemen you all knew that Christine Russell fancied herself as actress, but she keeps forgetting to mention one of her film credits, in 1967 while attending Colorado State University, she had the staring role in an untitled student film that makes most of today's porn films seem tame. 

Now I don't think I could classify myself as sexually promiscuous as some women, but I admit that I was no virgin bride either. The only married man I've slept is the one I married, and he is the only man I've slept with since. I had a long term committed relationship in college and I had few other relationships all consensual, all un-photographed, and the only time I've ever been pregnant was when I had my daughter. All told I've had sex with 5 men in my entire life. In that movie viewers could see you sleep with 5 men in what the first 7 minutes, maybe 10 if you limit your definition to vaginal intercourse?  But I haven't called you any names, or made any judgments or unfounded accusations.  I think I've been more than polite to you despite receiving no similar courtesy from you. And I have never physically attempted to assault you in any way, and have no intention to now.  But I am fed up with your abuse of me and the staff.  I am tired of you throwing votes away with making incendiary comments in front of the press.  You have officially exhausted my patience with your comments against President Bartlett.  

Up until now I have tried to help your husband's campaign despite it being completely outside of my job description and that no one has offered to pay me for the things I've been asked to do. I have done this out of loyalty to the party and to the people who have put so much work into get him polling at 53% in the most recent polls, despite all the bimbos he's fucked and people you have insulted. But right now I'm not even sure I'm going to vote for him, and I'm certainly done busting my ass trying to help him.  So I don't think I care if it costs you the election any more, I certainly don't care what it does to whatever shred of reputation you have left. So unless you want to see your ass on CNN, (and I do mean literally right there in living kodacolor, Jell-O and all), you might want to consider an attitude change.' After that she wished me luck with the election said goodnight to every body and left."

"Is there really a tape?"

"I don't know, but she sure went white and left in a hurry."

That was when Margaret who had been quietly making lists of things that needed to be done, and preliminary rules for Leo's care, chimed in with: "It's not a tape really it's more like a reel."

"How do you know?"

"We watched it. Who do you think timed the count?"

"Who's we? Who all has seen this thing?"

"Well that would be me, CJ, Donna, Ginger, Lynette, Rachel, Susan, Janice, Bonnie, Katie, Maddie, Millie, Abby, Zoey, Tanya, Sandy, Ellie, Danny, Charlie, Ainsley, Nancy, Debbie, Sherry, Joey, Kenny, Pam, and Bill, oh and the boys of the Colorado State University Tau Kappa Epsilon chapter in 1965, and probably the 1966 pledges to that same chapter."

Leo started processing that bulk list of names, while being used to that particular quirk of Margaret's, it was still something that astounded and annoyed him, "Ok that's a lot of people and three of them in the immediate family of the President at the time. What did you do throw a lets watch porno in the White House party?" 

"Sort of, it was a bachelorette party."

"A batchelorette party? But you listed guy names in there."

"Well Charlie found the equipment that allowed us to screen it, Bill was the projectionist, and Kenny was there because Joey was there."

"You screened this in the theater?  Wait a minute you mentioned another guy's name. Who was this Danny?  Concanon made himself scarce well before we were considering Russell."

"Well he was the one who got the film."

"Let me get this straight you arranged  for a screening of a pornographic movie staring the Vice President's wife, in the White House theater, with the majority of the First Family, White House senior support staff, other people who work at the White House, a Republican, and A senior reporter for the Washington Post!? Tell me how any of this sounded like a good idea!"

"That reminds me, we need to check your blood pressure in a little bit."

"Forget about the blood pressure for a moment woman! Because if you don't have a damn good reason, in the next 30 seconds, its not going to matter!"

Margaret looked around at the secret service agents who had now directed their attention at the yelling man in the wheel chair. "Calm down Leo. I have a good reason. I didn't arrange the entertainment CJ did, and since it was Bonnie's party and she was the one that suggested it I think it's only fair to blame her for watching it the second time."

"Second…Time! .... … OK I need a moment. … … Okay. … Now I want you to tell me from the beginning the story of this party."

"Back to 1965, or do you want me to skip ahead to when Danny was made aware of the film's existence?"

"Danny. Start with Danny."

"Danny Concanon was doing a little guest lecturing at Colorado State University while researching his last book, around the time Russell was confirmed. As he tells it he was sitting in a bar working on some notes, when footage of Russell being sworn in appeared on the TV. A couple alumni were sitting at the bar and recognized Mrs. Russell.  'Hey isn't that Christine Laseter?' 'Well it seems that she's Christine Russell now.' 'Seriously? ... Hunh now don't that beat all, one of those Chi Zetas is now the wife of the Vice President of these United States. What do you bet he doesn't know what she was like when she was here? Damn what a fine piece of ass!' 

Danny went over to them and said he couldn't help overhearing that they knew Mrs. Russell while she was a student here. 'Knew her? I think we her body better than she did ain't that right boys.' Danny bought them a few rounds and heard drunken stories of bravado & testosterone. How did he put it something like:  'stories of debauchery on a scale that I have never heard of before, and I used to write about politicians for a living.  For crying out loud, if I believed half the stuff I heard I would be trying to see if I could get commission for brokering their deal with "Hard Copy".' Then they told this about how she and a couple of her friends helped out at a recruiting party for new pledges one year, and one of them remembers how one of the guys in the frat was a had an uncle who was a big wig at Kodak who gave him one of those new super 8 camera setups, and a ton of film. 'Remember we used to show those films about once or twice a month until the guy graduated at the end of that year.' 'Did he take the film?' 'No he left it for the house, but nobody had a projector for it so we just hung on to it for a while and then put it in a time capsule since we couldn't watch it, and we figured it represented the times.' 'Oh yeah, too bad, it's probably worth something now, but no one will see it again till 2067.' 'What's to stop someone from opening it?'  'We all swore an oath.  More importantly it's buried in the house archives.  Someone would have to have access to the them, which is pretty much limited to the active members living in the house, know what they are looking for, and willing to spend hours searching for the right box, and who would want to do that?'

Well when Danny finally left the bar he went directly to his office and emailed one of his students who lived in that fraternity, and the personnel director at the Washington post. He then went shopping online and bought a dozen super 8 film cartages from that time period.  The next day he met had a meeting with the student he emailed.  Apparently he was a struggling student who showed a lot of promise, and had asked for a reference for some of the summer internships he was applying for. Danny offered him a deal a guaranteed good grade in class and a internship at the Washington Post, (which was far more prestigious and better paying than any of the internships he had a chance of getting on his own), in exchange for working as his research assistant and access to the TKE archives."

"So Danny bribed a kid to help him grab the film?"

"Yeah, after days of digging through a huge storage room and having the kid look for useless information Danny found the box.  After breaking the seal he found 9 cartridges and some other stuff. He sent the kid to go get some soda and swapped them with the blanks he bought. They re sealed the box and finished their research. The kid doesn't know that they were stolen and it's unlikely that anyone will know.  If anyone asks they'll find out that the only person doing research in there recently was a reporter, and if they actually existed then why didn't the reporter publish the lucrative story?"

Berryhill looked at Margaret with amusement as he asked the obvious question: "Why didn't he?"

"Because he felt bad about his role in that whole thing with Zoey, and CJ had gone out on a limb to help him risking serious repercussions, and he wanted to make amends by quashing the story.  He wasn't even planning on letting CJ know what he did.  But about a year later when that stuff started to get really bad with Andi, and after it became known that Mrs. Russell made her second attack on Ellie's research, he finished his book and came back to DD.  After Several brush offs he finally managed to sit down with CJ and talk things out.  After letting her know where he stood on things, he gave her the cartridges as a sign of good will.  He told her what was on them and only asked that if they were ever viewed that he could be there for the first screening so he could see what was on them."

"Where are they now?"

"Well you know how CJ occasionally talked about getting information from the sisterhood's house of blackmail? Not so much a house as much as a series of safety deposit boxes, It's safe."

Leo couldn't help but grin at that. "And That Mr. Vice President is why we never cross the sister hood. … What I'm curious about is you said things got better then between the two of them everything went to hell."

"Yeah their relationship seemed to improve and they managed to tolerate and be civil to each other most of the time.  Someone even managed to convince the First Lady to offer her the position of COS to the First Lady, which triggered the big blowup."

"Well anyone who knows her could have told you that that wasn't going to go well. What was the fallout?"

Christine got into a snit and the Russells crossed her off the list of people cleared to attend the Kennedy Center Honors Reception with out telling them.  When they showed up they were let in since they had the invitation and they were known to the guards. She was then stopped by the secret service, and had to go through a long process of figuring out what had happened. Since the invitation was for him and a guest and she had been thoroughly vetted they let them in.  Later Bob escorts them into another room, shouting was heard and then they left right afterwards. That was how they left things when they left for their vacation.  They became persona non gratis at the White House and I don't think that they really care." 

"Did you know anything about this?"

Margaret paused for a moment picking her words.  Leo knew this meant she only did this when she was avoiding actually revealing any information, because usually she would blather on ad nauseium, giving every fact that the photographic memory could recall. "All I'm going to say is this. The First Lady wasn't the sole person in that family that had a grudge with her, and they didn't make up their minds on the whole California thing till the 8th." 

Berryhill looked at the two perplexed: "What's on California?"

"What have you heard about next years California gubernatorial campaign?"

"Not much except whomever we run is going to lose, that actor is still to popular. We won't take that state back unless he decides to leave politics or that amendment he's been pushing gets past and he ends up running a national campaign, why"

"Have you heard that Senator Sam Seaborne is assembling an exploratory committee?"

"No. Is Seaborne going to ask him to run his campaign?"

"He's going to approach them to run his campaign as equal partners and then stay on as his COS and DCOS, because he knows that is what they are, a team.  The only chance of getting him by is by getting her. And with him comes the backing of Frank Pierce and better than even odds of getting the spin power of the Zeiglers.  And that is the start of a team that will put someone like Seaborne in the white house in seven years. Frankly Sam knows that fatherhood is to big of a draw for his old friend to not make it a family effort, he has already had a successful 25 year career and he wants her to have the same opportunity."

"Isn't Seaborne like one of his oldest friends and Zeiglers former protégé wouldn't he be able to get them any way?"

"Well that and the Blessing of Josiah Bartlett might be enough to get him despite the fact that he knows he would do more good for his country by going back to D.C. right now.   We don't know how bad we're bleeding right now but its bad and it's probably going to get worse much worse.  Even if everybody survives and honestly you need to be prepared for the certainty that they all won't and of those who do survive not all of them will come back, and to be perfectly frank you are going to need even more help than you had before to get this country past this.  If I could be there with you for all this I would, and I will do what I can, but we both know you are going to need the best people to reunify the country.  I can help you get him and because the country needs him right now I will, but you have to make me a few promises otherwise I'll let you try again on your own and work on a list of alternates. "

 "What do you mean by promises?"

"Well Jed and I both think of him as a son, but we aren't going to be around forever. If I bring him in I want your personal assurance that he's going to be taken care of, that his family is going to be taken care of.  That you're going to give him the freedom to do his job on his own terms, and that no one is going to bail on him when something goes wrong. I made that mistake a couple of times and it always came back to bite me in the ass. Things are going to happen but you need to have faith that he will be able to pull through.  He always has. You should let him bring some people in, he is furiously loyal and he has a lot of good people who are just as loyal to him. And finally that you will listen to his advice and truly give it the consideration it deserves."

"Are you sure he's worth putting that much on the line for?"

"Well the way I see it is I'm over anyways, and that's a very freeing place to negotiate from.  If you mean if I think playing hardball is what's best for the country, no I don't, He like a son to me and if I brought him in only to be chewed up and spit out then I'm not doing what's best for him or the country." 

"Sir I'm sorry, but they just recovered President Russell's body. Sir there is a judge on his way to swear you in then we have arranged for a helicopter to take you to your plane we can arrange to transport Mr. McGarry as well."

Berryhill looked at the agent for a second then remembered to continue breathing, then he turned back to Leo "All right, do what you need to do, set it up quick, this is going to be a huge job and I need the best, but since he is only able to work part time right now, I guess we are going to have to settle for Josh Lyman."

**TBC **

"Oh my god! Leo… Leo you're going to try and bring him back in, aren't you?"


	2. 365 part 2

Perspectives: Continuity: 365 part 2 (Second Edition)

*See Authors notes in 365 part 1

*I personally don't speak Yiddish and got words and phrases off of a Yiddish dictionary website I found at  

****** Continuity Chapter 2 *****

***** 365    Part 2 *****

 **December 21, 2007**** 11:35 AM EST Grand Wailea Resort, ****Wailea****Beach****Maui****, ****Hawaii**

Seeing as it wasn't even 7 AM local time it shouldn't have been a shock that most of the people milling around the main lobby area of the Grand Wailea had not heard the news of the attacks yet, and even if they had the sight in front of them still would have caused a shocked alertness. No less than 6 police cars, the local police's mobile command center, 3 Navy APCs and nearly a dozen other military communications and command vehicles enveloping the entire front parking area with dozens of heavily armed Marines and Navel troops  storming into the lobby or setting up an outer parameter, barricading entrance blocking access from the main road.  

"What is the meaning of this, this is private property, you people can't just come in here and invade us like this." Said the senior desk supervisor who had obviously not been listening to the news during her either of the two shifts she had pulled that day.  As far as she knew it was a long but otherwise perfectly normal Friday morning and she had another hour and a half till she could go home and forget about all of the rude guests she had had to deal with that night.

"Mam," a weathered looking man in a dress uniform that established him to be an admiral said as he made his way to the front desk, "I take it by your tone you are not aware of what has been happening to our country for the last couple of hours.  And since I doubt you'd believe me if I simply told you we were under attack I suggest you turn on a TV and see for your self."

One of the staffers who had heard this ran in to the bar that made up the center of the lobby and turned on one of the televisions which were always tuned in to one of the sports channels. "Fox News can now confirm with the latest bombings of the Luxor Resort and Casino in Las Vegas Nevada and Nathan Eckstein Middle School in Seattle Washington the total number of attacks has reached 137 in less than two hours." 

He turned another one on and tuned it to a local channel which was running a feed of fire fighters trying to control the fire of the blazing terminal of Honolulu International Airport in the lower left hand quarter of the screen while the rest of the picture was off of another national news network, "MSNBC has just obtained video footage of the swearing in of now President Berryhill before he was whisked on to his plane where he will remain for several more hours until we are sure the bombings are stopped for those of you just joining our coverage President Russell has been assassinated in the explosion of the mortar attack on the white house earlier this morning that was the first of many devastating attacks on our country this morning." 

Tuning another set to CNN showed an elderly bearded man with anger and sadness in his eyes, "The Sultan of Quamar has joined ranks with many of the world leaders in publicly denouncing the attacks on all of his nations national television and radio stations and has vowed to put any an all resources of his nation at the disposal of President Berryhill in bringing about swift and merciless justice to anyone who has even assisted those who have brought about this mornings attacks. We now have reports of bombings in every state including Hawaii and Alaska as well as the US protectorate states of Porto Rico and Guam."  

When she could finally bring herself to speak she managed to squeak out, "Are we a target is that why you're here?"

"To be honest with you Mam we just don't know all of what's been targeted or why, but I'm sure your guests will be glad to know that as long as we're here this will be one of the most secure places on the island and we will be here at least until we collect a few of your guests and decide what to do next. Which brings me to my point, you have a couple of guests here Josh & Donna Lyman, I need to know where they are right now also I need for your manager and the head of security to meet with this gentleman to my left we can make this a lot easier on all of us and help us avoid causing any undue stress to any of your guests."

"Admiral!" shouted a young officer who was scanning at a page of photos and pointing at a younger elderly lady in a one-piece swimsuit under a black silk wrap and robe. Her hands were full with a large beach bag and a smiling toddler who was wearing her own swimsuit and a pair of brightly colored water wings who had just stepped off the elevator. 

The admiral quickly made his way over to the woman who in turn was surveying the less than festive spectacle that had taken over the well decorated lobby.  "Are you Adriana Lyman?" 

"Yes I am admiral," she replied coolly, she had suspicions about how this man recognized her by sight and knew her name, none of them pleasant, "May I ask what it is I can do for you?"

"Can you show me some I.D. please we need to verify it is you. Also I was instructed to ask you how your thanksgiving diner went."

Ah, Leo had something to do with all this. Adriana relaxed as she handed Sarah off to one of the admiral's aides and reached into her bag to get out her drivers license.  She didn't know what was going on yet or how bad things were to bring about the current show of force, but she knew some one was looking out for their interests as long as Leo was involved. "Here you go admiral, and you can tell Leo McGarry for me that if he thinks I am ever going to try and eat another burnt bird, because he puts Margaret in charge of another holiday meal he is sadly mistaken. And when I next come out to Chicago I am collecting that diner at Bergof's he bribed us with to be quiet about it."

"Thank You mam, first I must ask you if you know where your son and daughter in law are."

"They went for a pre dawn snorkel off of the beach here.  They left with a dive master from the hotel they have an office down by the lower pool and could probably tell you exactly where they were going. May I ask what this is about?"

One of the admiral's aides took off running for the pool followed by 2 marines. "Mam, My name is Admiral Grey and as you probably have guessed Leo McGarry insisted that we made sure you and your family were safe and secure.  President Berryhill has dispatched a plane with his aide to collect you and your family.  I'm the Commander in Chief of the Pacific Allied Forces and I'm not even privy to why the additional security.  I'm not aware of what your clearance level is, but I assure you someone will fill you in on all you need to know. I can only assure you that while you are with us you and your family will be as safe as we can make you. Now if you would like to come with me my men are under instructions to patch you through directly to Mr. McGarry aboard Air Force One as soon as we found you."

"Wait a minute first of all you mean Vice President Berryhill and Leo McGarry has advanced liver cancer what is he doing out of bed, much less Air Force One?"

"Mam I'm sure he can explain in greater detail but it is now _President_ Berryhill and Leo McGarry is a trusted advisor and old friend of the President's. He is currently offering his council and assistance to the President in handling the current crisis."

"What's going on? What happened to President Russell? My son hasn't worked for the white house for several months. What does this have to do with him? I don't think he is going to be to happy to be called back."

"Mam, the country is under attack by an unknown entity, and President Russell was one of the first casualties. As far as your son, he is a brilliant man who has facilitated the successful resolution to many problems for his country and is a valuable asset.  We are here to ensure is protected from harm and facilitate a dialogue between him and the President.  If he decides to participate in this administration's efforts to restore the government and the country as a whole recover, then we are to offer any assistance we can. But here is Mr. McGarry. I think he can explain all of this better."

"Don't let my son hear you call him brilliant, sailor."  She said to the Admiral as she took the handset from the communications operator. "Hello? Leo?" Adriana said in to the handset of the secure satellite phone, keeping a watchful eye on the group of troops who had apparently been assigned to her granddaughter as a few of them started playing an impromptu game of tag with her, while others had formed perimeter around the game looking out for possible threats. In a way it was a blessing that Sarah spent so much time at the white house.  To her it was no big deal to be surrounded by soldiers she was used to having big playmates in camouflage.  She didn't see that something was terribly wrong.

"Bess is that you?" came a tired voice that was almost impossible to place with Leo McGarry unless you had been keeping pretty close tabs on his decline like she had.  He called her Bess a pet name that came about after one to many bridge games ending with her and Noah soundly beating Leo and Jenny.  Noah had once quipped don't mess with my wife she's as strong as Bess Truman and twice as smart. Some how the nick name stuck with the old friends and Leo and Jenny still called her Bess when it was just them and they were being casual.

"Rex you old dog you, I here you're flying in some of your old circles again. Care to explain yourself."  Joanie went through a phase when she was five where she desperately wanted a puppy, when she heard Noah to his friend Mr. McGarry as Leo, she remarked that Leo would be an excellent name for a puppy, but then again so would Rex. Thus giving birth to the nickname Leo bore in equally casual situations. This not being one of those situations but she figured that either Leo was trying to make sure it was really her or that the pain was making it difficult to speak. Either way it was a good idea to humor him and it was a family tradition to keep a sense of wit and humor in even the heaviest of conversations.  

"Chris was visiting me when the attacks started they went for him and Bob first off.  Chris is keeping me around as a sounding board until reinforcements show up. Most of his staff was taken out when they bombed his hotel. Bess I don't know what you've heard but its bad 143 bombings on United States soil, another 26 attempts have been stopped before they were able to pull them off. Key positions like the FBI headquarters and the Pentagon have been badly damaged. Bob Russell was killed when a mortar hit the white house. If it weren't for Chris making an unscheduled trip this morning you would have had to go down 8 places in the line of secession to find the next survivor.  They're hitting airports, schools, hotels, bridges, power plants; they even hit a couple of prisons. They have good intel and they know how to hurt us. Our best guess is we haven't seen any where near the end of the violence today."

"What does all this have to do with me? Is Josh a target?"

"Better than even money says he is… Bess they hit the farm in Manchester half an hour ago.  Thankfully Abby had already reported to her hospital to handle any additional emergencies that came in.  But Jed… Jed is in critical condition. They don't think it's likely he'll make it through the day. My house was hit 45 minutes ago, minutes after the secret service got us out of there. Epcot center was hit earlier today. That's where the Zeiglers were scheduled to be this morning, and we still haven't been able to reach them. Somebody is trying to cripple us today and we can't just sit by and let this happen.  We have to come back strong and show the world that America can't by a couple of thugs with big toys."

"Oh my god! Leo… Leo you're going to try and bring him back in, aren't you?"

"We need him Bess.  The country needs someone like him at the helm.  I can't be there for this one Bess, and Andrea is just not ready yet. Even if she were, she still is no Josh Lyman.  I wish it were different, but his country will be asking him to serve."

"No Leo, you are asking him to serve.  Most of the country only remembers him as the guy who got shot and then married his secretary a few years later.

" Ok I'm asking him to serve, them to serve.  Jed or Noah would have asked him if they were in my place right now. We need them, both of them."

"He was almost killed the last time and now he has a family to think about."

"What would Noah say right now? Right now, knowing what this country is going through today and what it's going to take to rebuild.  If I could do it, I would, believe me I would.  I'm going to do everything I can do to lessen the burden on him.  Until my last breath I will back him up.  It is now my mission in life to set him up, and take care of him in every way possible.  Christopher Berryhill is a good man and an honorable man and he is taking the reins under the worst of circumstances.  He needs a team who is can play this hand and win.  It's not just him that's going to be tagged to come back he is going to have a team he can work with, so I'm going to help him bring in the best people I can get.  Adriana I'm sending him Margaret to work as his assistant. She is already on a plane out there on her way to pick you all up. And right after I talk to Josh she is going to receive a message from me outlining that this is a permanent reassignment."

"Margaret leaving your side?  Willingly?  It's really that bad?" 

"Worse."

"Wow, okay, but what about you?"

"Well seeing as I don't have a house anymore I figure I'll take my old room back at the Watergate.  It will give me a chance to spend some time with Mallory before she moves to California, (if that still happens), and I will be able to pitch in here and lend a hand where I can."

"No what are you going to do for an assistant? She runs your life.  What are you going to do with out her? And it's not like she's going to go without a fight.  She'll never leave you without someone to take care of you."

"Well I guess there is now a position open for someone I can trust and who is willing to move to D.C. for a few months.  They would work part time keeping me organized and replacing the nurses as I fire them. It doesn't pay a whole lot but it comes with a security clearance so that they can stay in the loop and actually talk to their family members about the stuff they are working on, and White House access so they could see those loved ones.  Who ever took the position would have time to spend with any children in they're lives such as grand children. Especially if that child has parents with big important jobs and can't spend as much time with them as they like.  Of course who ever did take the job would have to bring said child over frequently especially on my trips to the White House or around the country with the senior staff. Probably most importantly it would have to be someone that can stand up to Margaret and who she trusts.  Because she is going to try and do both jobs and we both know that this move is the best thing for her, the best thing for all of them.  I mean it's not like he's going to be able to get his old assistant to take the same position again.   Rumor has it he wouldn't want her as a secretary any more, she ended up sleeping with her last boss, and I hear there is a position open for a deputy chief of staff, which he might think would be a better fit for someone with her abilities."

"Sounds an awful lot like a job offer there Rex, I don't know if you can afford me. What's more how did you get Margaret to agree to a career change?  She was quite happy working for her last boss and this new guy has a reputation for being tough on secretaries. You're going to offer DCOS really? How did you convince Berryhill to go for all of this?."

"If you want the job it's yours.  As for getting Dona the promotion it was easy, they're a team and its time Chris now understands that.  Someone might have hinted since he putting his own career on hold so that she could have one of her own opportunities, then it would probably be in a perspective employer's best interest to arrange for that.  As for Margaret, I haven't told her that this was a permanent career change yet. I hinted and I think it will finally sink in about halfway across the pacific, where she will attempt to turn the plane around.  But I think she will eventually see that it is where she is needed, especially after my note. It will help knowing there is somebody competent looking after me.  If all else fails she is going to receive a healthy bump in pay grade as soon as the paperwork goes through.  If somebody wants to mention that a few dozen times that might help. To be honest I don't have much time left and I want to make sure she is taken care of before I go.  She needs to move on with her life, and having someone to look after will help her cope when I go. If she still has problems with that I'll have my new assistant talk her into it."

"Sound pretty confident there Rex."

"Yeah well I figured you couldn't say no to more time with Sarah and I have more than enough money to pay whatever exurbanite fee you would name to try and deter me.  As far as the rest, these are some of the most honorable, passionate people I know.  Give them enough time and a nudge in the right direction and they will make the right choice, as hard as it is.  The person I'm most worried about being able to convince is Josh and unfortunately he's the ball game."

"Well as your new assistant I will do what I can on my end, unfortunately I think you're right. It has to be his decision to stay.  It won't take much to get him to help a little, but if you want him to lead then you need to let him decide that for himself.  Whatever he decides he is going to have to talk with Dona before he'll say anything, which actually works in your favor.  Depending on how bad today gets you might have a chance. Let me talk it over with Admiral Grey see if we can come up with anything, I'm assuming the security clearance thing starts immediately."

"The president will sign the papers within the hour. Let me talk to Grey and take care of our boy." 

"All right and you take care of your self and your charge. It will probably be several hours before you will be able to land. Take a nap at some point. This transition is going to take all of us including you. Don't die on us the first day, or I'll have Margaret Fed-Ex your remains to the Guadalajara school of medicine for derelicts.  We've had too many losses today already." Then speaking out to the Admiral who was busy directing his men nearby: "Hey, Sailor boy, telephone." 

As she handed the phone to Admiral Grey, Adriana Lyman surveyed the scene in front of her. Her three year old granddaughter (who was still wearing her swimsuit and water wings) was running around laughing and chasing a young soldier who was obviously forcing himself to smile and be silly.  They were surrounded by several other soldiers and police officers all of whom visibly wore the strain of this day already exhausted despite the early hour. Past them was an ornately decorated five star hotel lobby all trimmed out for Christmas and prominently displaying a six foot menorah.  Only yesterday had been filled with relaxed tourists wondering through to the shops or the pools.  Today it was filled with marines and nervous people timidly eying the soldiers as they gathered around the TVs or rushed off to find their loved ones.  Past the lobby she could barely make out the ocean where she saw at least one coast guard cutter and a huge navy patrol boat. As she stood there in her swimsuit surrounded by troops she was moved to offer a prayer for her family, her loved ones and friends, and for the families of those who had and would lose somebody today.  She thought to add her country into her prayers, after all for all intensive purposes was at war, (even though they did not yet know against who), but she couldn't bring herself to complete that thought.  She knew that some prayers are better answered by one own actions, so instead she prayed that she have the fortitude to live with her decision, that the people who answered today's call made it through to the other end of this more or less in tact.  She prayed that her son who had already given more that one should be asked to give, not be a chamoole see this as the mutek mitzvah of a mentsh kemfer. 

**December 21, 2007 11:55 AM EST Ocean off of the Grand Wailea Resort, Wailea Beach Maui, Hawaii**

This was one of those times when Donna couldn't believe how her life had turned out.  Swimming out along the reef for a predawn snorkel, she reflected on just how fortunate she has been.  First having the strength to leave a bad situation and everything she had known, to go volunteer for a black horse presidential candidate half a continent away.  Then some how ending up working in the white house and having her voice be heard, despite only having a high school education.  The man she loves surviving a traumatic event and eventually marrying her.  Finishing her bachelor's degree and giving birth to her daughter Sarah then ending her tenure at the white house as deputy chief of staff in charge of strategic planning and legislative affairs.  Completeing her graduate work in record time while Josh stayed home with their daughter before leaving for this extended vacation in Hawaii.  Josh surprised her at graduation with not only a month at one of Maui's finest resorts, but by bringing his mom along to baby sit Sarah.  They have had time to do things on their own like learn to scuba dive.  Better still, he was flying all of her family out to celebrate Christmas in Hawaii with them.  He said this was his way of trying to make up for all of those Christmases she had missed during the Bartlett administration.  Probably what got her most was the man's total devotion to her and the family they had created, turning down several offers to work at a high level in this administration so that she could finish school and so that he could spend time with Sarah. 

She had the impression that there were more offers than she knew about and most of the offers that she knew about she found out about them from outside sources and Josh never mentioned them unless she asked about them. His vague answers gave her the impression he was intentionally avoiding discussing the issue. But outside of his reluctance to discuss working at the White House again, he had always been open, honest and giving with her.  She also knew that part of why he turned them down had to do with the stuff that happened when Russell first took office as Vice president, and during the campaign, and that he still couldn't talk about that without getting upset, so it was probably for the best.  He was very vocal about how their marriage was a partnership and since he had already had a long and successful career that she had supported him through it was his turn to do the same for her, knowing that he could get a good job wherever they ended up even if it meant giving up a chance to frame the next 8 year of this countries future.  

Then she noticed the lights.  8 of them all moving in towards them from further out in the ocean, 4 more were coming in from the left.  Josh noticed them to and immediately swam to put himself between the lights and his wife. Their guide and the 3 other people on this outing all turned to the lights as well.  This was not part of the tour.  As the lights came closer it became clear that these were dive sleds each dragging or carrying two divers. When the divers got to the tour group they stopped and started pointing to the U.S. Navy labels on their wetsuits and sleds, and communicated to the group that they were to close ranks and keep their heads above the surface so they could hear instructions.  The dive master an ex-navy guy himself started to encourage the group to do as instructed and complied himself.  When they actually looked out around the surface Josh and Dona could barely recognize that they were in the same waters, 1 navel patrol boat and three coast guard cutters were patrolling the waters out in front of the hotels.  The Coast Guard Cutters docking with the boats that were moored out in front of the Grand Wailea, further out in the ocean a large navy submarine surfaced making it evident where the majority of divers had come from.  On the beach they could see armed Marines pouring out of the hotel trying to set up a secure beach head.  What wasn't clear was why this was happening.  Surely out in front of a bunch of hotels was not a good place to lead joint exercises especially the week before Christmas. 

A circle of Navy divers had surrounded the group and checked in to confirm that they had found a group that matched the description of the one they were looking for, and received an update about the situation developing on one of the yachts in front of the objective's hotel. A small inflatable launch came towards them from the shore and when it arrived, the ranking officer aboard addressed the group of surprisingly calm tourists that they had essentially detained, directing his comments primarily to that couple that closely matched the objectives of this mission. "Ladies and Gentleman I apologize for disrupting your morning My Name is Commander Laurence Davis and I am with the United States Navy.  It is very important that I find Josh and Dona Lyman.  Are they in this group?"

"I'm Josh Lyman." The man of the identified couple confirmed. "And I'm Donna.  What's going on Commander?" asked the young blonde telling him more about his new charges.

"Just a second mam. Who is the Dive Master of this tour?"

"That would be me, sir" the guide said concerned about the safety of his guests, he had taken the Lymans out for several dives and snorkeling trips during their stay here and it seemed hard for him to believe that they were the kind of people who were dangerous enough to be apprehended in such a dramatic fashion, in fact Mr. Lyman had always been a respectful guest, a quick learner, and most importantly a big tipper. "Is there a problem here?"

"Ok son here is the deal, there are some safety concerns at your original launch site so you and the rest of your guests are going to continue your tour until one of your escorts directs you to deviate course and then the United States Coast Guard is going to add something very special to your tour this morning, you and each of your guests will be given a personal guided tour of the United States Coast Guard Cutter Kittiwake before being returning to your hotel.  Each of your guests has been cleared for the bonus tour, do you think they will have any trouble with the extra challenge."

"Mrs. Hoffman over here will require some assistance getting aboard sir, but other than that shouldn't be a problem. Sir if I may ask, you keep saying the rest of my guests are the Lymans being detained for something they did wrong?"

" Not at all Sergeant, the President of the United States has personally asked us to see if they would be able to offer some assistance dealing with some of the problems happening on the mainland.  Any more than that, you will see in the news as you need to know it.  You will all be briefed in further detail on the Kittiwake. Now I understand that they are using all of their own equipment, and have prepaid for the tour so there is no reason that they need to accompany you back to the dive shop. Is that correct?"

"Well actually sir," came a much more relaxed voice after knowing that a couple of his favorite customers were not in any trouble, but was still trying to wrap her mind around the concept that they were friends of the President. "Mrs. Lyman broke her goggles during a dive yesterday when she got smacked by a sea turtle yesterday because she got to close to it. No need to worry about it though, they have been such good customers I'll cover any charges for their replacement.  However the Lymans left most of their new dive equipment at the shop because they had planed several other excursions for the next couple of weeks."

"Ok, when you get back your first task is going to be to locate their gear and prepare it for transport.  One of your escorts will help you by providing luggage for said equipment, as well as compensating you with a large gratuity. Are there any questions, from any of you?"

4 heads dumbly shook their heads signaling that there in fact were no questions that anyone was willing to voice.

"Very well, You will be escorted by a few officers for the remainder of your tour this morning, please try and enjoy the rest of your tour and remember that as long as you are with these officers you are perfectly safe. Bye bye now."

"Ok People, My name is Lieutenant Tran if you will all put your goggles and masks back on and follow me we are all going to continue exploring this beautiful natural reef in this early light if you have any trouble keeping up please signal one of my men or your dive master and we will either slow down or give you assistance.  Ok everybody ready? Great, let's go." 

Josh watched as the tour group all quickly swam away with half a dozen new friends, and then turned his focus back to the man who was taking credit for disrupting his vacation in such an urgent and visible fashion. "Ok Commander you want to explain what could have prompted Russell to pull something like this.  I don't work for the White House anymore. _We_ don't work for the White House anymore.  And its one thing to disrupt a private citizens personal vacation for say a national security reason, but what in gods name so important that it couldn't wait till we were, say I don't know, on dry land? And what do you mean security issues with the beach it looks like you have a company of Marines out their scaring the tourists."

Commander Davis chose not to answer because he was allowing the group to get further away as well as communicating with his CO and directly with CINCPAC Admiral Grey.  He was only slightly surprised to see the legendary Lyman Attitude flare up had been so mild, finished getting his unique instructions from Admiral Grey and the all clear from the coast guard before responding to the understandably upset man treading water in front of him.  "Sir I need to verify that you are indeed Joshua and Donnatella Lyman as obviously neither of you are carrying Identification.  Perhaps there is something you might remember from a Christmas card that might help us verify who you are?"

Leo! Josh remembered that Leo had tried to give him a NSA card three times before he finally took it. What finally made him reconsider is when Leo had brought him, CJ, Toby, and Dona all in to his office and handed each of them a hallmark Christmas Card inscribed with the words "peace on earth goodwill towards men" (ok well on CJ's and Donna's the word men had been crossed out and the word all had been hand written in everyone above it but that's not the point) each card came with a NSA card enclosed in it. Truly a touching gesture of personal care towards his staff even though he ended up retiring less than three months later. "Yes Commander my NSA card number is NJ2-3YL6-SDA. My watchword is red-lights."

"Confirmed and you mam?"

"Yes Commander it has been a while since I looked at it, but I believe my card number is DM8-X73U-JLS, and that word they told me to give the signals office if I had to confirm who I was on the phone was valuable.

"Confirmed.  As to your first question it was President Berryhill who ordered the abundant security measures.  Before you go off about how bad it looks, I am supposed to offer you a choice we can either escort you to that Bayliner over there and you can physically assault the three terrorists who were planning on launching a Mortar Attack on your hotel. Only one of the 34 attacks we have been able to stop today or we can escort you back to shore and hug your daughter and mother who are now perfectly safe and hear directly from Admiral Grey the other 152 reasons why we are here."

Josh stopped dumbstruck and just looked at the officer, occasionally opening his mouth and then closing it with out saying anything for almost a full minute as he processed the information he just received before he was actually able to speak.   When he regained his composure enough to talk he said: "I think going to shore right now sounds like the best course of action but something in your voice tells me I'm going to want to keep that physical assault option open for a bit."

"Ok sir, if you and your wife would like to come aboard here we'll take you to see Admiral Grey."


	3. 365 part 3

Perspectives: Continuity: 365 part 3 (Second Edition)

*See Authors notes in 365 part 1

*Blue Oyster Cult I just saw your note, sure I'd be glad for the help. If any one else is interested as well let me know.

****** Continuity Chapter 3 *****

***** 365    Part 3 *****

**December 21, 2007 12:07 AM EST Beach in front of the Grand Wailea Resort, Wailea Beach Maui, Hawaii**

If not for the overwhelming mood of seriousness the scene unfolding would have looked somewhat comical Joshua Lyman with his wet curly hair frizzing all over, standing in his marine blue and lime green half wetsuit and Dona in her neon pink and black half wetsuit each being assisted in their stumbling out of the launch with very little grace by marines. Josh getting caught up in the tide and losing his balance didn't help appearances as he ended up being almost carried out of the surf under the watchful eye a marine guard detail with waterproof carbines.  Standing on shore watching were 4 high ranking navy officers in dress uniform one of whom was holding 3 year old Sarah Lyman in her frilly white swim suit with red trim and lime green water wings, and in full tantrum mode, all surrounded by heavily armed marines in battle gear. Joining the scene was Adriana Lyman still in her black swim suite, black and gold dressing robe, big floppy black hat and sun glasses, as she escorted a very solemn Admiral Percy Fitzwallace Ret. in oversized blue and white floral print swimming trunks, an open red and white floral print Hawaiian shirt, and flip flops, and his pissed off wife who was yelling at the marines who were escorting them to the rest of the group.  

"Fitz!  You old hound dog, I didn't know you where on the island.  Any idea what they want with a couple of obviously retired men such as our selves?"

"Frankly, Josh I am not in the mood for frivolities I was just told that there were a whole lot of bombings on the main land including at one of my granddaughters schools and that My wife and I probably weren't safe at our condo and then they dragged my ass out here. How bout you, you look like you are well briefed."

"Yeah they came and collected Dona and I while we were out for a swim and told us that president Berryhill issued orders for heightened security, oh yeah Leos some how involved and that the big bay-liner out there was holding a group of terrorists who were going to shell the hotel and I get to go kick them later."

"President Berryhill?..."

Admiral Grey stepped away from the other officers and joined the group of soon to be ex-civilians. "If you two gentleman are done chatting perhaps I can fill you all in on what's happened over the last couple of hours.  Dr. Fitzwallace would you mind terribly taking this young lady to the children's pool area she has been wanting to go for the last 15 minutes but we wanted the Lymans to see that she was safe and in good hands before letting her go play.  One of the men escorting you will be happy to pick you something up from the bar and get you a line out to St. Luis to check in with your family."

"What about my mother?  I'm assuming your briefing is going to contain some classified information and I don't think she has a very high security clearance."

"Mr. McGarry's assistant has been cleared for all of this."

"Leo's assistant?  What happened to Margaret Connelly?"

"_Your_ new assistant is currently on a government gulf-stream jet which should touch down in 2 hours 42 minutes."

"What the fu.."

"Joshua this will probably go a lot smoother if you let him talk."

"Thank you Mrs. Lyman."

"Please call me Donna, she's also Mrs. Lyman and well it's just easier."

"Kay, so here is the situation, at 10:03 AM Eastern Standard Time a small mortar shell hit the east wing of the Whitehouse killing President Russell as well as three of his Secret Service detail and critically injuring the first lady. Since then there have been 164 separate attacks hitting a broad range of targets and new attacks are being reported at an alarming pace. We haven't had enough time to shortlist of who's behind this yet. So right now let's just talk about how bad our chain of command has been hit. If it hadn't been for President Berryhill's visit to Leo McGarry this morning we would now be looking 8 places down the order of secession to find our next president. Several members of both the senate and the house were killed or injured when the capital building was hit and part of the dome collapsed, but since congress was in recess it is not as bad as it could have been.  Most of the cabinet was taken out in individual attacks or when the car bomb went off outside of the OEOB.  A large portion of the staff in the executive branch was killed in the OEOB attack or when they blew up the hotel that President Berryhill was staying at.  5 members of the Supreme Court have been confirmed dead

Nancy McNally is still unconscious at GW, and several key leaders in the CIA, NSA, FBI, DEA, ATF, and FTA along with the Joint Chiefs and CINCNORTH/CINCNORAD were all killed when an explosion went off inside of the bunker where they were meeting or in individual attacks. The Pentagon was hit worse than it was during 9/11. The headquarters of the most of our investigation and intelligence agencies were hit, including the FBI. Russell's chief of staff and communication director both are safe for the moment. The enemy has good intel and apparently some inside access.  We obviously have some traitors at some high levels and it is not just personnel from this administration that they are targeting, obviously they were targeting you, Leo McGarry's home was hit minutes after the secret service extracted the president and him, Epcot Center was one of the first places hit this morning and that is where the Zeigler's were scheduled to be this morning. We have not been able to reach them so we are currently listing them as missing.  Former President Newman is dead as is his wife, but we were able to move Walken to safety before any attack could be made against him, though he apparently has not stopped yelling at his agents because his little dog was killed in the process, (though its possible that it was one of our people that killed it).  Hoynes was only superficially wounded but we haven't recovered his ex-wife yet.  We were also able to secure the 4 other Supreme Court Justices as well as several a large number of other federal appellate court judges.  The most demoralizing civilian fatality so far for most of you to hear will be that they hit the farm of Josiah Bartlett over an hour ago and he was pronounced dead just 15 minutes ago."

"Dear god! How is Abby holding up?" Donna gasped as everyone else silently processed all of this information, pained grief was impossible to hide for everyone. Donna's face went from shock to outrage to puzzlement "Not that I don't appreciate you taking the time to tell us and everything but I still don't understand why you are _here_ telling _us_ all of this, none of us work in the white house anymore and this is a time when obviously the country needs all of the remaining commanders, you know commanding.  Yet here we are a retired admiral, a _former_ senior official, his wife and his mother all of whom obviously pulled from recreational activities to be briefed by the commander of the pacific fleet who by the way has traveled from a whole different island to do this. The obvious question is why?"

Admiral Grey looked at the young woman for a moment then lifted his eyes to meet her husbands who gave him a look of understanding and encouragement.  He quickly scanned the faces of the others all of whom had either been briefed before or trained to know what this conversation actually was. He paused a second longer as he decided how to put this, he had been briefed by the President and by Leo McGarry on the importance of handling this correctly. This was going to be productive they needed to come willingly, and with their eyes wide open. "The president spoke with Andrea Blake earlier, she has expressed that if there is someone better to handle this situation who is willing to step forward she is more than happy to step down as white house chief of staff and serve as one of his chief deputies."

"One of?" Josh asked, half in surprise at this departure in the pitch he was expecting, and half out of trying to help in the set up for the suspected second half of the pitch before the sand that had managed to work its way into his wetsuit worked it's way into places it really didn't belong or caused his arm to start bleeding as it scraped around between his tight sleeves and his arm. 

"Yes," Grey answered grateful that Lyman was so quick on the uptake, and slightly reassured that maybe this guy was worth all of this extra hassle. "The President feels that there is going to be a tremendous amount of work going through that office so it would be prudent to increase the number of people to handle it.  Also he feels that there is a highly qualified candidate that would otherwise not be able to take the position do to the additional restrictions that would be placed on the sole deputy do to the heightened security." 

"What kind of restrictions?"

"Well travel for one thing, and where they could be outside of the office at the same time.  For instance if there was only one deputy she would not be able to go to any unsecured location were the chief of staff was at the same time, such as a public restaurant, park or other non cordoned off location."

"And since there are two?"

"Well as long as one of them follows those restrictions then the other wouldn't those same restrictions, in fact if they found it easier to meet outside the white house, say if one of them needed to take care of a sick child at home or say they wanted to have lunch together outside the office they would be able to do so." 

"Or they could even live in the same house or if they wanted to, right?" 

"That's correct Mr. Lyman."

"Ok so are you trying to tell us that the president wants Josh to be his Chief of Staff and that he wants me to be one of his deputies?"

"Well you have built quite the reputation of being a formable force when you work as partners that far exceeds the sum of the independently highly qualified parts.  This country needs the best people it can find to do important jobs and we really can't be too concerned if the most productive way for that to happen is to have spouses working with each other. You have developed a system that works exceptionally well and it would be foolish of us to come in and try and change it."

"It's not like there was any other way we could have handled Leo's retirement." Dona mumbled quietly. She was devoting so much of her mental capacity to accepting that one of her biggest hero's had past away, that when Grey triggered the memory of how they're capacity as partners became common knowledge throughout the upper levels of the government, that she was not able to censor herself. She quickly tried to change topics by asking "What about Sarah?"

"The president has been quite insistent that all of the senior staff with young children should be able to do their jobs and be parents to their children.  24 hour day care and security will be available on site or near where ever either parent is working, so whether you are in the white house or abroad your daughter will be able to be near by and have some one looking after her."

"Security?"

"Yes I'm afraid each of you will have to have your own Secret Service Detail, as will everyone in a household of senior staff members"

"Secret Service?  What? I can see for Josh and maybe even for me but for Sarah? What is the press going to say?"

"Mam, we were hurt pretty badly today and everything is indicating that we're going to be bleeding for a while. The president's staff and their families will continue to be high priority targets.  We almost lost your husband once, and if we had not put such high security measures in place you all would likely have been hit by the mortar attack that those terrorists in that boat over there were planning. Mam this president has expressed flexibility with regard to any of your concerns except when it comes to insuring your safety or that of your daughter.  He is willing to take the hit from the press rather than risk losing any more key members of his staff.  Also you have some protection afforded by the previous administration. Did you ever wonder why you never were asked to return your NSA cards after you left your positions?"

"Not really, Josh said something about residual communication concerns and that it had something to do with his consulting work, and that I shouldn't worry too much about it."

"Well the short answer is technically neither of you left government service you are both still officially classified as senior presidential advisors who are on indefinite extended leave without pay. Despite how you all thought of each other Russell took Bartlett's advice and kept both of you on.  President Russell refused to give up on bringing Mr. Lyman inside his inner brain trust. Which will expedite the process if you both accept our proposal, since Ms. Blake is on a month to month contract while Russell continued his recruitment efforts she doesn't have to resign or be demoted, (both of which would be poorly received by the public). Both of you will both be reassigned from senior advisors into your new positions and she will just be hired on to fill this newly created position after deciding not to renew her current position. 

"Ok Admiral, you've effective demonstrated spent a good deal of time in D.C. before moving out here, and that you know how the game is played.  So seeing as you are on the inside and considerably more up to date on what is going on than us, I've got a question, who else is being tapped to staff the Berryhill administration?"

"You're going have to be more specific mam, we've been hit in a lot of areas, what area are you asking about in particular?" 

"Well let's start with senior staff, analysts, and advisors, you know, the people we will be working with most closely in whatever form we decide to come back in."

Josh, anxious to get out of his sandy and quickly drying wetsuit was starting to lose patience with the conversation spoke up as he pulled at his sleeves. "Specifically what I want to know is; who is functioning right now and isn't going to crumble because they are casualties to heavy personal losses, mental or emotional breakdown, or debilitating injuries?  I know everyone is going to be thrown off their game by all of this.  Some are walking wounded and some are suiting up to play.  Since you're trying to put together a team I would just like to know what our options are for a starting lineup."

Donna who had managed to maintain a composed appearance up until Josh mentioned Mental and emotional concerns and her face instantly lost all the color it had gained from weeks in the sun.  "Josh …I didn't think of… how are you….are you ok?"

Everyone stopped at that. Grey found out about Josh's PTSD while preparing for this meeting as one of the things to be on the watch for, the rest were there after Roslyn and saw Josh wrestle those demons. While everyone else stood there not knowing what to say next, Josh took a moment to reflect and assess his status and realized that he didn't notice any of the signals that he was starting to have an attack. Noticing everyone's uneasiness with concern and Donna's obvious panic he knew he had to kill this concern right away.  He reached out and grabbed Donna's limp hand and said: 

"Yeah, I'm doing ok. In fact I'm a doing a lot better than a lot of people right now. That is probably why I'm doing so well right now.  I'm not guaranteeing that I won't have an attack later on the line, especially after I talk to Leo and Abby, but I'm good right now.  Donna, you will know when I having a problem, probably before I do.  As I promised you, as long as I have you and Sarah, I have al I need to get through anything.

Mom, Fitz, you have seen me when I was going through the worst of it, I trust you to call me if you see any of the signs and to listen to Donna if she tells you I need help, (and more importantly when I'm ok). Admiral I know we have only worked indirectly with each other and only met a few times, but as the saying goes "bloody wars and sickly seasons" you are about to come inside. I know your career highlights and you have undoubtedly been studying up on me recently, but more importantly I know your reputation for being a quick thinking, stand-up guy, (who trusts the people he's working with and knowing enough to know your limitations), and if we end up working together you're going to have to trust me to do the same. I know I don't have a reputation for acknowledging my own limitations, but I have a loving, talented, and freakishly strong wife who makes that happen whether I agree or not. Listen to her and trust her to let you know if I need anything.

As much as I would love to discuss my fear of rectangles or any other of my numerous psychoses, I hope we can table this conversation till later.  Admiral you haven't answered my question yet, you don't have to list the whole bench but it would help me plan my next move if I knew who some of the players are."

"As I told you before, things are changing all the time and we are still in the early stage of most of our rescue operations at the various sites. For the moment all I can confirm are the Whitehouse Chief of Staff, Andrea Blake, Deputy Chief of Staff Scott Holcomb Communications Director William Bailey, Deputy Communications Director Eloise Snuffin, Rachel Warren Mrs. Russell's Chief of Staff, Cabinet Secretaries of Homeland Security, Commerce, Health and Human Services, Transportation, Energy, Veterans Affairs, and a few policy advisors including a couple of guys Leo kept referring to as the Vanilla Twins. We are still trying to contact the Zeiglers and some of the other Bartletteers that Leo gave us who have moved on to other things. I assume you will have some additions you think should be added to the list.  We can have a better estimation for you by your briefing before we head out the airport."

"Yeah that going to be priority item, the sooner we track people down the easier it will be to appraise patterns in today's attacks see how many are targeting specific objectives vs. are decoys,  or mass scare tactics. Even more importantly it will give us a starting place to assess where the leaks are so we can take appropriate corrective measures. How credible of a threat are we talking about here? Are we looking at one or to guys who looked the other way when they saw suspicious behavior, or are we looking at the possibility that we have one or more deep moles?  What did you mean when you said there are people on the inside?"

"Sir we had a major explosion from a device place inside a secure conference room that was in a bunker fifty feet underground. The location of that meeting had only been decided 20 minutes before it started and up until today the only thing that bunker had been used for was to store a huge reserve of cash to be used to reestablish the currency after a nuclear war, backup computers designed to interface with world markets to help revitalize industry after an national crisis of previously unprecedented proportion, and archives of highly classified documents. Not to mention the fact that even though it was no longer part of the NCA command and control network, it still maintained the capacity and was considered to be a secondary backup site should the need arise. With all do respect less than a year ago you were Whitehouse Chief of Staff and still you wouldn't be able to get into that bunker until you were officially reinstated as COS and had at least 6 different official documents that identify you in that position your express reason for being at that site and what specific areas within that site you needed to access, or you were accompanying someone within the direct NCA or UCP command chains in the event of a verified eminent apocalyptic. At this time I can safely say with utmost assurance that we probably have multiple deep moles with extremely hi-level clearance as well as several active agents who are attacking this government from within its own infrastructure. The only questions is how, where, who, and most importantly how many are there and how much damage do they have the potential to create."

"Shit, okay that makes this more difficult. Have you already started shuffling people into secure locations?"

"Yes sir, each of the remaining cabinet secretaries has been moved individual secure undisclosed locations, as has former president Walken and the remains of Congress who were still in town and aren't in the hospital. President Berryhill is in the air and will remain up there for the next several hours. Other officials are…"

Josh suddenly went ridged at the thought that just dawned on him. Instantly sending warning bells off within Donna's mind, that he might be having an attack. But before she could reach him he went a little week in the knees.  He grabbed an arm of both officers to stabilize himself, while still barely managing to keep the horror of his realization out of his shaken voice he cut them all off by saying. "Fitz tell me if I'm wrong but if the terrorists have people on the inside and they are targeting the command structure in a blazon full on assault and had already targeted the someone twice in one day then they probably are counting on him being dead or out of the way before they can proceed with the next phase of whatever this whole thing is. Then if I were them and I knew the procedure for protecting the President and had access to information like where that plane might be or where it was going to land and when then I might be mighty tempted to try to take him out again. You know since we are pretty much delivering him and anybody else in the government that they want to target directly into there well positioned waiting arms and all."

The group stopped cold at this for the first time instantly the immense weight of what was happening hit all of them. Up until then even though they were less than 200 meters away from the boat which two now injured men and one had just been taken into custody and another had been killed because they were about to blow up the building in which Dr. Fitzwallace had just entered with three year old Sarah Lyman and a couple of Admiral Grey's aides, the enormity of the situation was not real to them until that moment. The entire infrastructure that the United States federal government depended on was literally crumbling around them and the weight of what remained was going to have to be balanced on a few key pressure points and though they all looked the same some of them were mined with duplicity, and just waiting to take out another chunk and do even more damage till the whole thing collapses under its own weight. 

Percy Fitzwallace was struck mute for only the third time in his life, for about 30 seconds all he could do was gesture before weekly get out "You know how much I hate telling you you're right as a general rule. Unfortunately this time I think you may actually be bringing up some legitimate concerns." 

All three men were slipping back into their natural game mode, trading good natured barbs at each other and sarcastic humor, to keep the serious threats that were facing them from pressing to heavy on their shoulders they had been through this before in simulations and war games. They were veterans at this, they were professionals. 

Both of the Mrs. Lymans were extremely strong competent women, and while neither of them had participated in the training for this that came was part of the deal when gaining unfettered access to the sit-room, they had spent years supporting and being strong for men that did. The shift came naturally to them and it didn't faze any of them that it was Adrianna that vocalized what had to happen next. "Well given this new concern perhaps we should table the effort to make sure that there is fit staff to facilitate the Berryhill administration's ability to do what is needed to maintain reassemble a nation and spend the next few minutes considering what the reassembled staff needs 

**TBC **

Preview for 365 part 4

"Admiral unless you have other information that we need to hear before we consider your proposal, I think my wife and I need to discuss this with each other before we go any further and we probably will need to talk to Sarah as well.  Fitz, you are probably going to need to have a similar discussion with your wife as well. …..."

"...  A Chief of Staff to the President could never make the time to take his daughter to gymnastics or dance lessens.  A member of the Cabinet would defiantly miss several recitals and meets. And there is no way the Vice President of the United States could plan a big party for his daughter's third birthday at storybook land only to scrap those plans and drag 25 toddlers their parents, not to mention about a dozen of her parents closest friends to the zoo at the last minute because when his daughter came downstairs that morning all she wanted to do for her birthday was go to the Zoo and tease the Elephants because one of the mean bad pelican men said something mean about her Grandpa Bartlett on TV and made her Mommy cry."


	4. 365 part 4

Perspectives: Continuity: 365 part 4 (Second Edition)

See Authors notes in 365 part 1

Blue Oyster Cult I just saw your note, sure I'd be glad for the help. If any one else is interested as well let me know.

Sorry it has taken  me so long to post but the real world has been kicking my behind and after breaking my foot and watching to many pizza commercials I  have been researching a story I want to work on in Chipmunk's Twilight Universe.  You will be able to see in on her site once I have enough done on it to be able to post part of it.  You can also see all of her great stories there. She has created a wonderful  Leo and Margaret universe and along with Spitzthecat's Joshua Monologues is in my opinion one of the all time best West Wing Fan Fic Series of all time. 

Yes I know this ends abruptly but I figured it was better to get something out there than not post anything till I had the rest of the on the ground stuff done.

I have had the hardest time posting this so I apologize if you tries to read this chapter earlier and found it lacking content.

** Continuity Chapter 4 **

** 365    Part 4 **

**December 21, 2007 12:32 AM EST Beach in front of the Grand Wailea Resort, Wailea Beach Maui, Hawaii**

Josh went into master strategist mode, his skin irritation from his wetsuit only served to sharpen his abilities.  "Ok, I think my wife and I need to discuss this with each other before we go too much further and we probably will need to talk to Sarah as well. Mom you might want to change and then I would appreciate it if you would head up the effort to come up with a comprehensive list of key players and what their status is.  I want to know where they are and the condition they are in.  If they can't be accounted for I want to know what efforts are being made to find them, where they were last seen, when, and what they had scheduled for today."

"Key Players?"

"Yeah you know elected officials, key advisors and staff members of the last few administrations, heads of major PACS, party leadership of the major parties, etc. Admiral Grey will have someone arrange for you to have a temporary staff here as well as work space and whatever communication resources you need.  You are going to work with White House Operations, as well as FEMA and the other involved agencies.  I'm pretty sure Angela already has Ed and Larry on this, as well as a large chunk of the communication and legislative affairs staff doing most of the leg work.  You are primarily going to focus them, familiarize yourself with that information, and dispense it in an understandable format when called upon for it.  You are going to be our liaison with the placement effort as well as ensuring that some of our people don't get over looked. But we're not going to worry about phase two and three yet, I just want a preliminary list as soon as you can have it.  Just make sure you have it in less than an hour.  I also want you to sync up Donna's planner thingy and have the white house switchboard make preliminary courtesy calls to all the contact numbers for everyone in the secure SFC & SFA files and locate them so we can have a call sheet ready when I can get to it. Also we are going to need to make arrangements to include anyone who isn't already in the NCA command and control evacuation system in the process. We are going to want most of them to end up at the same place we do but not all of them.

"You don't want much from your mother do you?  This is what I get for letting Noah bring him to the office to often."

Donna smirked, "Just wait till Danny's book comes out his highness's ego is going to need its own castle. Oh and Adriana, Jed and Abby are in the SFA directory we are going to want to put her on our call sheet but I assume we already know where she is and don't need anyone to disturb her any more than need be today."

Fitz, who had been mentally checking things off his own mental checklist couldn't resist smirking at mention of the unpopular subject. "That's right I forgot we are in the presence of the all powerful kingmaker.  Grey I don't know if you covered this in your briefing but this is one of the few men to ever receive an executive order to agree to let a Pulitzer Prize wining author write a book about him."

"Hey first of all, I don't think the phrase 'all powerful' is in the title, though it's not a bad idea. Secondly instead of talking about the book shouldn't we be making sure this administration is around long enough to let me out of it? Ok, Fitz it's pretty obvious we are back in the game for now. I don't want you to reenlist quite yet, but it's probably best if you remain a civilian for the moment. I don't know how involved we will be come February, a lot of that will depend on our families, and what happens in the next few days. But if I'm going to do this I would really like it if you would consider staying on for awhile. This country is going to need strong leaders who can communicate well with the white house senior staff.  Seeing as you are the only one of us who knows how to change the carpet in the Oval, we would all be better off if you can show us how that is done with out making too much of a mess.  If I need to I'll even change my shampoo for you.  All kidding aside, I know how you talk and frankly I think you could be an asset in helping us come back from this and showing those who did this to us exactly how much we value our freedom.  Even if I am not running things, I'm sure that this administration will find you invaluable. Talk it over with your wife, while they find you some more appropriate clothing. When you're ready I would like you to get caught up on what's been going on since you've been out of the loop. I would like to get your take on the situation at a briefing in one hour. Particularly where you feel we are most vulnerable internally and what our priorities need to be to shore things up. Specifically what steps we need to take to prevent further damage to our command structure."

"Admiral unless you have other pressing information that we need to hear before we leave you, I think my wife and I need to talk some things out.  I need you to oversee the local arrangements.  Admiral Fitzwallace is going to need an appropriate uniform; and appropriate staffing requirements are going to need to be met. Also check on how many seats there are in the plane, we are going to need enough room to fit: Admiral Fitzwallace and his wife, my family and myself, Margaret, you, and possibly a few key members of your staff.  I want a complete update of what's going on and what precautions are being taken in one hour.  I want you to put together a presentation covering the same material I asked Admiral Fitzwallace to cover as well.  I want to see your two different viewpoints and where the similarities are.  Also this will help me assess your briefing style, which will help with their communication down the line.  I assume you have people packing our stuff. We are going to need our phones and her planner as well as a change of clothes. Also if we can arrange for someone to look after Sarah I would appreciate it, though we are going to talk to her sometime soon.  Is it possible to arrange a place where we can get a shower, and have a bit more privacy then the public showers?  Also it would be a sign of good faith as people who a trying to recruit her for a top level executive position that you might want to check up on the rest of my wife's family and do what you can to make sure they are reasonably safe. After we talk where do we find you?"

"We have set up a command center in the parking circle; I'll probably be out there.  I'll have someone set you up in one of the changing rooms in the spa.  I would assume that you'll be dressed and have your decision ready by 13:45?"

"I think that is probably a fair amount of time." Josh said grabbing his wife's hand and checking her watch.  "I assume Leo has directed you to notify him as soon as I'm available to receive his call."

"Yes sir, as a matter of fact he's waiting to talk to you right now, my aid has a secure satellite phone already tied in to the planes switchboard.  He wanted to talk to you when your wife before you made your decision.  If you're ready to take the call now the rest of us will go ahead and take care what you ask for.  I just hope you're worth of all of this, because you are one hell of an arrogant son of a bitch for so many people to put so much effort into, when there's so many other larger problems to deal with today." 

Josh took the phone from the aid and took a deep breath, he knew that this pitch was going to make Admiral Gray's attempt look like an Antarctic Frigidaire catalog. "Leo?"

"Hey son, how's the vacation? I hope we are not interrupting anything important."

"Well you know how it is sun, sand, terrorists with mortar launchers; the typical family vacation. I hear you're moving up in the world. Are you calling to brag about getting a window seat?"

"I think you know why I'm calling it's your time again. I know you're looking for the next twelve years off, but we just can't afford that right now. Tell you what why don't I let you think about it for a little bit while I talk to Donna?"

Josh started to say something but then thought better of it. He handed the phone to Donna and said: "Leo want to talk to you", and handed off towards the little cement platform for Donna's morning yoga class sometimes met.

Donna was somewhat surprised as Josh past the phone off to her. Leo had always had a special relationship with Josh, and she felt like she was somehow intruding upon that. "Hello Leo?"

"Hey doll, how you holding up? Listen I think we need to talk for a minute before I talk to Josh."

"Sure Leo what can I do for you?"

"I want to know what you think of all this. I know it's a lot of information to swallow at once, and I know how much you were looking forward to some time away from the White House. But this is the biggest crisis is this country is faced in modern time and we would be negligent in not try to put the best people in charge of coming back from this. And by that I mean both you and Josh; you guys are a team and I would be foolish to ignore that fact. Even without him you would still be on my list of people to call. You've come a long way kiddo."

"I don't know Leo; I know it's the right thing to do.  I'm just scared of what it will do to him."

"You and me both. I only went forward with recommending him after receiving certain assurance from the new President.  President Berryhill is nothing like Bob Russell Donna, he is a good and loyal man. We need you both on our team and he is the best person to lead this team to victory."

"Okay you know he is not really an expert on foreign policy right? If you suddenly thought that we could turn him in to some modern day General Washington I think you have picked the wrong guy. He is not equipped to be the president's general. He's not a Macarthur or Patton; he is more of a Kissinger, or Clay."

"I'm well aware of Josh's weaknesses in that area and that's not what I was talking about. But I before I get back to my point I just want to say that he has good instincts and he will surround himself with good advisors, and You will be there to keep him from going to far beyond his abilities. But that's not what I was talking about. Let me tell you a story."

"Leo you realize this call is costing our tax payers almost a hundred dollars a minute right?"

"Humor an old man okay.  There once was this hole."

"Leo I'm going to stop you right there. Josh has told me your hole story more times than he gave your wheat thin day talk. Don't get me wrong, it's a good story it's just..." She took a moment to look at Josh who was just standing looking out at the ocean, lost in thought.  "Leo no one has been down this hole since Lincoln, and as much as he teases you about your age grandpa, even you can't claim to have been around that long.  This is going to take every thing we have, and I don't want to come out on the other side of this with out him. That's not fair to Sarah and it would kill me to. There are only so many times you can almost loses someone before the fates give up putting you back together again."

"I know Donna, but hear me out this is a different hole story.  This time there is a hole that just pops out of no where and starts swallowing up the town as it just kept growing.  Well the mayor and most of the city council got swallowed up right away and got pretty banged up in the process.   Any way the town had a deputy mayor who was a real stand up guy and even though he managed not to get swallowed up by the hole he jumped in to help the townspeople who continued to fall down into this hole.  Well the deputy mayor, (who was for all intensive purposes now mayor), had an old friend who had a lot of experience with other sorts of holes. This friend immediately volunteered to help the new mayor save his town. But he got twisted his ankle and broke his arm jumping in to the hole, so it so be came apparent that he would not be able to do much of the work the official would need him to do but be limited to advising the mayor and who ever was able to help. One thing the friend remembered to bring was his cell phone, and he knew the phone numbers to several of the town's best engineers who could handle a lot of the work. That engineer knowing the risks to himself and his family jumped in that whole because he knew that he was probably the only person who could keep the whole from swallowing the town.  The man with the phone helped as much as he could but because of the pain couldn't really do much more than arrange for other people to help the engineer and give advice.  The engineer was able to call a team of people who would be able to work on the problem.  They worked hard and had a few setbacks but eventually built a way out for most of the people in the whole and a bridge over it.  The point is Donna some wholes tale more than a friend, time and patience to get out of.  Sometimes you need to fight the good fight against the hole or it just gets bigger until it swallows up everybody"

"I understand Leo but do you realize what you're asking of him, asking of us?"

"More than you do kiddo. But can you think of anybody else who could do even remotely as good of a job at rebuilding this country as he could.  This is the moment that generations will judge us by.  How do you want history to judge him Dona?  To judge you? You are going to be a big part of this too."

"Leo I know I don't have much of a choice but…"

"No see you do that's what makes us work is we do have a choice.  Every day we choose to do what we do.  We choose to live with the costs. And when those costs out way the rewords we can choose to do something else."

"No Leo we can't. You know that. We can't.  We can't just sit there and do nothing while everyone else falls into that pit.  We have to do our part.  But that doesn't mean I can't hate that for a few minutes.  I'm entitled to at least acknowledge what this is going to cost us.  You'll get your man Leo and we'll do our best to build a team to make this right but at least admit that this isn't fair." 

"Dona My best friend died today and I have been forced to ask my son and his family to sacrifice everything, possibly even his life to save us.  countless families are being torn apart and losing loved ones today.  Tell me exactly about today is fair!"

"I'll talk to him Leo. I promise.  You rest and keep Berryhill on course we'll be in touch again a little later."

"Ok Donna.  Take care of him for me. And take care of Margaret, she's been dreading this day since she found out I was sick. I don't think she ever thought it would happen while I was still alive."

"I will Leo. I promise. Goodbye." Dona hung up the phone, and took a minute to gather herself and suck in the tears that were now streaming down her face.  She walked over to Josh and they walked a little further from the rest of their new entourage to get a few moments of privacy.

As they left the group Josh and Donna headed over to the cement slab that overlooked the water, while the marines assigned to them kept a respectful distance.

"Why didn't you tell me about all of their offers? What is going on? Were we aware something like this might happen?  Where you?  Wait, did you just tell the commander of the pacific fleet that he had to check on my family if he wanted anything from me? What makes you think he'd do it? Do you think they're ok? Oh Josh, what are we going to do? What do we tell Sarah? Do you really want to work for Berryhill? How can we not? This is big Josh. What do we do? Hunh?  Ok sorry I just needed a moment, you can talk now.

"It's ok Donna it's perfectly understandable. If you hadn't spoken first it would have been me asking the questions, but you want to hear my answers, even though you aren't going to like most of them?"

Donna slowly nodded "unh huh, sure."

Josh looked at her sizing her up, and took a deep slow sighing breath, resigning to the inevitable reality of the moment. "Ok I didn't tell you because I wanted this to be your time.  You have so much potential and I don't want to be the one that casts a shadow on that. I knew that you wouldn't make it as easy as you have for me to take this time for you and for Sarah and just be a father and husband.  You would have put me first like you always have and I wanted to be the one to do that for you. You put your life on hold for a decade, you gave birth to my daughter, and gave life to my hopes and dreams every day in every way that you could.  You made me healthy numerous times when I could have easily slipped away.  You made me whole. You knew about some of the offers but like I've said before I can get a position anywhere and I want to be where you are and be there for you so you can do what is best for you.  I have been able to experience things that I never would able to if I had stayed.  A Chief of Staff to the President could never make the time to take his daughter to gymnastics or dance lessens.  A member of the Cabinet would defiantly miss several recitals and meets. And the Vice President of the United States can't plan a big party for his daughter's third birthday at storybook land only to scrap those plans and drag 25 toddlers their parents, not to mention about a dozen of her parents closest friends to the zoo at the last minute because when his daughter came downstairs that morning all she wanted to do for her birthday was go to the Zoo and tease the Elephants because one of the mean bad elephant men said something mean about her Grandpa Bartlett on TV and made her Mommy cry."

"Vice…"

"Shh, you asked a bunch of questions and I want to answer those first before we get caught up on a thing."

"Josh!...Ok finish but don't think I'm going to let this go because we are going to have to talk about this one mister."

Josh almost smiled as his mood lightened for a split second before the gravity of the day hit him again. "Don't be in such a hurry to get upset with me about this Donna.  Yes I was wrong not to be fully upfront about this with you and we probably should have discussed some of those offers as a family before dismissing them, but my being out of government service is the only thing that has kept us safe so far today.  Ok that, and a whole bunch of Navy Seals, and there's the company of marines, and well then there are the crews of those ships out there, but mainly it was the fact I decided to be an unemployed bum I crediting for us being here together on this cliff yoga landing pad thingy, and being alive in one piece and bringing the banter."

"You think this is funny?"

"No but sarcasm and humor is a defense mechanism, it has always been how we dealt with crises. It wouldn't be us if we didn't bring the banter and honestly I find it comforting and I need comforting right now."

"You want I should see if I can get bubba over there to give you a big hug?" she said pointing to the largest marine on their guard detail.

Josh stopped cold looking at his wife in amused shock then bent in and gave her a kiss on the forehead and turned her around and pulled her in to a spooning position. Him leaning back against a tree trunk and her leaning back a against him, legs out in front of her, looking out at the water and the large naval presence in these tourist waters. "Thank you, No. and thank you for being so wonderful and understanding."

"So you going to answer my questions anytime soon, because I've got sand in my wetsuit, a million more questions, and oh yeah a Navy admiral is giving our daughter a piggy back ride as he escorts your mom to a secure communications area so she can say hi to the new president and give him her guess on whether we are on his payroll or not."

"Kay now you're just being snarky.  Alright the answers to the questions I haven't answered yet: We are under attack by one or more terrorist organizations and it's the winter solstice so between the fact that it is the shortest day of the year and it looks like what ever we decide we are going to be spending a lot more time inside for the next few weeks, I am considerably less worried about your alabaster skin getting sunburned than I was yesterday."

"You realize if we're going to do this thing we're going to have to get be up front with each other. We have a lot of work to do and I plan on making sure that we survive through all this.  That's not going to happen if you just ignore our problems."

"We're really going to do this?  You aren't upset giving up your life long ambition of being married to a beach bum?"

"I'm not going to have history judge me as the woman who made her husband give up his dream of making a better America. And I'm not gong to have history judge my man as someone who shirked away from his duty and resented his family for it.  Now come on let's get you out of that wet suit mr. beach bum or I'm going to be picking sand out of my teeth for a week."  Dona said flirtingly as she took his hand and started off for the Spa. "Oh and boss I'm going to want a better office and we are seriously going to have to revise that kissing in the office rule again."

T.B.C.

Next time

"Margaret I'm Having my own plan problems right now, do you really think I can do any thing about yours.  Besides it's time and you know it."


End file.
